


when i'm with my baby (all the bad things disappear)

by akaiiko



Series: of all the things my hands have held (the best by far is you) [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: (But Not Lovers Yet Whoops), Alternate Universe - College/University, But They're All From the Same Fic, Daddy Kink, Friends to Lovers, M/M, One Shot Collection, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Veteran Shiro (Voltron)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-08-15
Packaged: 2020-06-26 15:41:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19771318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akaiiko/pseuds/akaiiko
Summary: Shiro's been through warzones, but nothing can bring him to his knees quite like Keith.The lack of response still grates on his nerves. Up since o dark thirty, he’s been run ragged between classes and meetings and office hours, only to be told that his entire group had decided to shift their meeting to later in the day without consulting him. It’s not fair to be annoyed. Keith doesn’t know any of this. Isn’t doing anything wrong.But Shiro wants—in an aching, shameful, needy kind of way—to call Keith. To say,don’t you know how to say thank you?History supplies exactly how Keith’s breathing would falter and the sulky embarrassment of his mumbled thank you. After that, Shiro could step in and relieve Keith with a teasingknew you could do it. It wouldn’t matter, exactly, what they said after that. Because he’d know that Keith was willing to be good for him—to be soft and obedient and so fuckinggood. Just for him. Only for him. That’d be enough to ease some of the tightness in his chest.With a frustrated grunt, he shoves his phone back into his pocket. In the end he’ll only ever take what Keith’s willing to give him.





	1. the one with the cartoons (dcmb chap 1)

**Author's Note:**

> 1) this is a bonus ficlet because somehow dcmb got 2k kudos and i got 500 twitter followers neither of which seem entirely real yet but here we are.
> 
> 2) you probably want to read at least the first chapter of dcmb, here be spoilers.
> 
> 3) ngl i’m probably going to keep yeeting shiro pov ficlets into this as inspiration strikes or as people ask.

The brass put him through multiple rounds of psychological eval, back when they were working his discharge and getting him set up for his third surgery in as many weeks. Most of that time’s a blur that he’s never tried to put into order. Shiro’s not a masochist. Doesn’t need to diagram how exactly his life fell apart.

One of the few things he remembers clear is one of the psychologists—a brusque, overworked lieutenant with tired eyes—who’d told him that he better start learning what his new situation normal was. _It won’t ever go back to whatever it was before,_ she’d said. _Adapt._ Startled by the blunt command, he’d let out a bark of laughter and said back, _Situation normal...still all fucked up._ Maybe he wasn’t the first person to make that joke to her, they were in a military hospital a hop skip from a warzone after all, but she still laughed.

Shiro doesn’t think of her much more often than he thinks of anything else surrounding his discharge, but he thinks of her now. His thumb hovers over the **Send** button on his phone.

> **Shiro 4:03 PM** What’s the magic word?
> 
> **Keith 4:03 PM** please
> 
> **_Shiro 4:04 PM_ ** _I want to hear you say it. Call me._

Letting his breath hiss out between his teeth, he reluctantly deletes the message and types in something normal.

> **Shiro 4:05 PM** Stir fry it is.

No response, but he kind of figured there wouldn’t be. Keith doesn’t like texting. Barely tolerates it for his sake and usually outright ignores anyone else. Even that brief conversation was a concession. Shiro _knows_ that.

The lack of response still grates on his nerves. Up since o dark thirty, he’s been run ragged between classes and meetings and office hours, only to be told that his entire group had decided to shift their meeting to later in the day without consulting him. It’s not fair to be annoyed. Keith doesn’t know any of this. Isn’t doing anything wrong.

But Shiro wants—in an aching, shameful, needy kind of way—to call Keith. To say, _don’t you know how to say thank you?_ History supplies exactly how Keith’s breathing would falter and the sulky embarrassment of his mumbled _thank you_ . After that, Shiro could step in and relieve Keith with a teasing _knew you could do it_ . It wouldn’t matter, exactly, what they said after that. Because he’d know that Keith was willing to be good for him—to be soft and obedient and so fucking _good_. Just for him. Only for him. That’d be enough to ease some of the tightness in his chest.

With a frustrated grunt, he shoves his phone back into his pocket. In the end he’ll only ever take what Keith’s willing to give him.

Muscle memory carries him through the next few hours. He keeps his head through the group meeting, even when no one show up with their actual work and the whole thing is nearly a bust. He keeps his head as he goes to the hole in the wall restaurant across from the library to pick up stir fry, repacks the plastic bag to be more balanced, and heads home. He keeps his head, which on anyone else would look a lot like disassociating.

The world’s starting to blur at the edges by the time he unlocks the door and wrestles his way into their dorm. He vaguely notes the over bright sound of the TV, the warmth of the room, the early streetlights framed through the open blinds. It’s fine. Everything’s fine.

“Let her die!”

Keith brings everything into focus. He’s sitting on the couch. Out in the open, and Shiro’s not going to think about how that’s becoming more common. He’s wearing those damn shorts and Shiro’s hoodie. The hoodie is too big for him, and he’s tucked his hands into the sleeves while he nibbles on one cuff absentmindedly. He’s _home_.

All of this registers in a split second. Shiro’s crossed the distance between them before he can think about it.

When he sits, he drops his backpack to the floor without giving a shit about the expensive textbooks or delicate notes in it. It’s only the takeout in his hands that keeps him from reaching across the distance to pull Keith into his arms. This close, the stubborn curve of Keith’s lower lip is infinitely sweet and kissable. Shiro wants to nip at that subtle pout and then kiss away the ache.

They talk—the usual easy bullshit that Shiro doesn’t have to entirely pay attention to.

Keith starts eating with his usual speed and lack of delicacy. Sometimes Shiro wonders at that. He learned to eat that way when he went to Ranger school and had ten minutes to cram in his calories for the day. Keith’s never said where he learned it, but it’s easy to guess from the way he guards his food and the way he forgets to eat when he’s stressed. One day they’ll talk about it. What matters now is how he doesn’t flinch or try to cover his food when Shiro drapes an arm over the back of the couch. 

Asking why they’re watching a magical girl cartoon isn’t anything but keeping the conversation going. He’s a little surprised that Keith seems to give it actual thought.

Warmth unfurls in his chest at the little furrow between Keith’s eyebrows. It’s impossible to resist the urge to curl his fingers through the soft dark locks at Keith’s nape. Touching like this is the kind of luxury he doesn’t usually allow himself, and it leaves him feeling indulgent and overly relaxed as Keith trails into silence. “Mhm?” he prompts.

“I guess I never really watched things like this when I was little,” Keith says. He sounds unsure. It only compounds as he adds, “It seemed like it could be fun?”

A half smile quirks Shiro’s lips. Maybe he shouldn’t tease. “You mean you didn’t watch magical girl cartoons?”

“No, I just...didn’t watch things in general.” The earlier disassociation is catching up with Shiro. Later, when he debriefs himself, he won’t be able to decide if his slowed processing was a benefit or not. “I guess I might’ve, with my dad,” who Keith never talks about, except in passing, like he doesn’t like to remember what it was like to not be alone, “but after they put me in the system I— The last place I ever wanted to be was at one of the homes watching a TV show.”

Right when a mortar hits, if it’s close, there’s a moment that feels like all the oxygen’s getting sucked out of the world. People’s lungs can collapse if they’re not careful. If they don’t know how to breathe through it. Shiro never got used to it. Just learned to breathe through the aftermath. This feels a little like that. “Keith…” 

Keith jolts away from him with an aborted noise. It’s achingly close to a whimper, but he doesn’t seem to realize it, too busy throwing the remote into Shiro’s lap. “We can watch something else. Your choice.”

Ignoring the urge to apologize—it’ll just make Keith shut down further—Shiro picks up the remote. The plastic doesn’t feel as good beneath his fingertips as Keith had. (Nothing feels as good as Keith does.) Carefully he backs them out of the magical girl show and tries to figure out what would work as a substitute.

Truth is he doesn’t give a _shit_ about watching something. But six months ago, Keith’s would’ve already fled and that _your choice_ is the closest either of them will get to a stay of execution.

A title card catches his eye. One of the guys he bunked with back in Iraq had this on DVD and pulled it out to watch it every time they had a bad patrol. Shiro tries for casual as he asks, “Did you get to watch Disney?”

The dead silence is probably answer enough, but Shiro waits it out because waiting it out is just about the only thing that’s worked tonight so far. Takes until Keith’s put down the empty takeout container and tucked his legs up into his chest—huddling in the furthest corner like he’s still expecting someone to hurt him. “Not really,” he offers up.

Lot of ways Shiro could respond to that, but he settles for something that won’t make either of them flinch. “Okay.”

By now Shiro knows to play casual. He puts down the remote and picks up his own takeout container. When he feels Keith’s eyes on him, he makes a show of digging into his food like this is normal. Like all of this— _any_ of this—is normal. “I love this movie,” he adds, because Keith’s still staring at him and because it’s actually true. “This part is great.”

Part way through his food, he finally dares a glance Keith’s way. Still some tension in the set of his shoulders, and still tucked into a ball in the corner of the couch, but it’s not a huddle anymore. When he finishes his food, he’s confident enough to go with a full look at Keith.

His boy’s nibbling on his hoodie’s cuff again.

Shiro feels desire like a punch to the gut. It’s selfish. Better to leave well enough alone. Allow this moment to be what it is instead of trying to make it like all those fantasies he uses to get through the worst times. Keep to what stands as their situation normal. Be kinder, less greedy, _better_ —

When Keith jolts this time, it’s more coltish than frightened. He blinks over at Shiro like the sweep of his eyelashes can substitute for Morse code. “Sorry,” Shiro lies. “Trying to get comfortable.”

“Do you want me to take the floor?”

“ _No_.” It’s harder than it should be not to growl that. Clinging to easy, to casual, to nonthreatening, he nudges his foot against Keith’s. “You should come over here.”

For a heartbeat—the kind that comes caught in his throat—he thinks maybe he’s hallucinating. Because Keith doesn’t even hesitate before following the soft spoken command. He crawls across the couch toward Shiro, face so _fucking_ open and sweet, until he’s straddling Shiro’s chest. No going back now, Shiro figures as he swings both his legs up onto the couch. No going back when Keith bites at his lower lip and pauses, uncertain, or when Shiro slips his prosthetic hand under the hoodie to anchor at the small of Keith’s back.

“I said come here,” he says. Lets the command out clearer this time. Reinforces it with the press of his hand. And Keith—

Keith submits.

Shiro feels proud and selfish and warm and possessive. He keeps stroking his fingertips over Keith’s spine—gentle but firm, the way he knows Keith likes—until his boy all but melts into him. It’s a little like having a weighted blanket. Even when he hooks his leg over Keith’s, his boy stays pliant, settling back in with a murmur. This is his. Keith is _his_. Shiro wants to keep him exactly like this forever.

“Good?” he asks. Not sure what’s driving him, because he knows Keith would never allow this if it didn’t make him happy, but needing to hear it anyway.

“Yeah,” Keith says. His voice is small, but not in the way that it gets when he’s frightened or unsure. A new small, like how he sounded when Shiro gave him the hoodie. He shifts then, and nuzzles his face into the crook of Shiro’s neck like a kitten seeking comfort. “I like this.”

God, Shiro’d give anything to have this be his new situation normal. It’s not even a little fucked up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this fic and others like it are made possible by readers like you who vote in questionable polls on [my twitter](https://twitter.com/akaiikowrites). y'all are the real ones.


	2. the one with the laundry incident (pre dcmb)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> everyone thank [@patchoffeathers](https://twitter.com/PatchOfFeathers) for making sure that the Laundry Incident got the chance to live on.

“I used to be able to do this.” No one answers his announcement, because Keith’s never up before 9AM unless someone pries him away from his bed with a crowbar. “I once stayed up for 56 hours.” It’d been the worst patrol of his life. By the end, he’d be streaked with sand and his clothes were so caked with dried sweat that they could stand up on their own. “Fifty- _fucking_ -six hours.” Of getting shot at while navigating hostile territory back to the FOB. Which did a lot to keep him awake. “This is nothing.”

Shiro goes and turns on the coffee pot for the third time.

The truth is that Radiation Measurements in Astrophysics has been kicking his ass for weeks. He’s never been great for memorization—even before his brain got rattled a few times—and the professor relies almost exclusively on rote memorization of formulas for tests. Plus, a good 80% of their grades are riding shotgun on midterms and finals. It’s a bad time.

Passing this class means burying himself in flashcards. Sometimes at the cost of sleep. _You’ll sleep when you’re dead, soldier_.

While the coffee brews he flips through formulas. They’re coming easier. Half the time he recognizes the shape of them better than he does the actual numbers and symbols. At least he probably won’t _fail_. Keith would tell him that’s enough, but Keith doesn’t understand how badly Shiro needs to succeed. To be enough. Fuck, that’s not true. Keith understands, he just thinks that Shiro’s already enough. He’s sweet, so goddamn sweet. Shiro doesn’t get three formulas in a row and feels his stomach twist in a way that might be nerves or might be subsisting off coffee for two days straight.

Leaning his hip against the counter, Shiro pours himself a fresh cup and starts back at the beginning of his cards. Keith’s door opens with a squeak. It needs to be oiled. He’ll do that this weekend. “Coffee?” he offers.

“In a minute,” Keith answers. He grunts, half frustrated, as he walks past and flips the lock on the door. “Gotta run a load down first.”

Shiro grunts back agreeably.

Maybe he should start up a chore chart for them both. Something to keep Keith on track so he stops having to do laundry during midterms. It’s a gamble. Keith’s prideful and easily upset whenever something reminds him that he’s not good at taking care of himself.

At least he slept last night. At least he’s doing laundry. At least he lets Shiro take care of him, sometimes.

For the first time in hours, Shiro puts down the flashcards. It takes less than a minute to make Keith’s coffee the way he likes—milky brown and heavily sugared—but he doesn’t want to mess it up. Once that’s done, he puts it in front of Keith’s favorite chair. If he’s lucky, maybe Keith’ll be willing to sit there and quiz him and sip coffee.

Bitch of it is, he can’t actually wait for that. It’ll take a good 10 minutes for Keith to get back. The stack of flashcards he needs to get through in the next 30 minutes is almost 80 deep. He’s halfway through—there’s so goddamn many of them—when he hears Keith.

A year and some change of living together have made Shiro familiar with Keith sounds when he’s distressed. Even when that distress is muffled by a door. Just now he can’t make out the words, but he doesn’t need to when the cadence of Keith’s voice says _frustration_ and _confusion_. Other voices rise up—teasing, pitchy, cajoling. It’s a conversation. Just not one that Keith wants to be having.

Putting down his coffee and his flashcards, Shiro walks over to the door and yanks it open. Only takes a few seconds to get the lay of the land.

Here’s Keith, back almost to the door, the lines of his body tensed in the way a cat tenses before it lashes out. There’s another four people, strangers, three girls and one boy. All of them look young and stupid and greedy.

Shiro knows this game—the one that happens when people suddenly realize that Keith is beautiful and fierce and vibrant. The game starts when Keith figures out an equation with a self-satisfied grin. Or when Keith launches himself into a fight with all the fluid grace of a desert cat. Or when Keith, like now, _forgets to wear a shirt in public_.

The game ends when Shiro grips Keith’s shoulder and stares down at the mouthbreathers clogging the doorway. “What’s going on?” The feel of skin—warm and slightly tacky with sweat beneath his palm—is the only thing that lets him sound pleasant.

Not that pleasant though. One of the girls takes a half step back. Another looks away even as she says, “We were just asking Keith about what he was doing this weekend.”

Yeah, he fucking _bets_ they were. “Hm.”

Keith looks over his shoulder at Shiro, dark eyes worried and framed with faint stress lines. “I just— I told them I’m busy but— I don’t—” If Shiro lets him, he’ll keep going like this. Struggling along between justifying himself and trying not to offend. Good thing Shiro doesn’t intend to let him.

“It’s okay,” he says, squeezing Keith’s shoulder gently. The look he gives the others is anything but.

“We didn’t mean anything—” the boy starts.

“Your coffee is ready,” Shiro says. A small part of him likes the way the boy shuts up at the overruling. “Why don’t you go get it?” A larger part of him likes the way Keith nods and eagerly ducks around him into their dorm. Once he’s out of the line of fire, Shiro lets himself scowl. “Learn to take a hint,” he says. One of girls, the one who spoke earlier, opens her mouth like she’s got a comeback. Shiro honestly doesn’t care. He steps back and slams the door shut in her face. In all their faces.

When he turns around, Keith’s sitting at the table with the coffee mug cupped in his slender hands. His eyes are wide, and his mouth is a little open, and he looks like everything Shiro’s ever wanted. And he’s still shirtless.

“Did you wait until you were out of shirts to do laundry again?” he asks. A slow nod is the only response. He reaches back and tugs off his own tee with one hand. Balling it up, he tosses it at Keith. The other man catches it reflexively, then stares down at it blankly. “Wear that until you’re done with laundry. I’ve got a final. Won’t be here to chase off the next group if you keep parading around shirtless.”

Shiro doesn’t think he sounds that threatening. More commanding than usual, maybe, but not threatening. Keith hurries to obey anyway, all but yanking the shirt over his head and leaving his hair more ruffled than usual. He cements the idea that maybe Shiro’s been a little too rough with him by muttering, “sorry,” while he looks away to hide his flushed cheeks.

“It’s _okay_.”

Tentatively, Keith looks back at him as he cups his hands around the coffee mug again. Shirt’s too big for him, collar dipping low to bare his collarbone, and it makes him look achingly vulnerable. It’s uncomfortable to realize how easily he could become addicted to the sight of Keith in his clothes.

“Okay?” Keith asks.

Fuck, he was definitely too rough. Nodding tightly, Shiro gives in to the urge to ruffle Keith’s hair and is rewarded by the way Keith relaxes beneath his hand. The strands curling around his fingers are soft and thick. Another thing he could get addicted to, but he doesn’t have time for that. “Yeah. That wasn’t your fault. Just keep the shirt on.”

Maybe Keith’s going to answer—or maybe he’s just going to let Shiro keep petting him. They’ll never know which it is because Shiro’s phone starts to chime insistently. Groaning, Shiro pulls away and heads toward the door. He scoops up his backpack on the way and slings it over one shoulder. “I’ll be back after my midterm,” he says. Then bites his tongue against the urge to add, _Be good until I get back_.

“Uh—” The door’s already open, and Shiro’s going to be cutting it close if he lingers. He stills looks back. Keith’s flushed high on his cheekbones. “You. You’re not wearing a shirt.”

Goddamnit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always, you can come say hi @ [my twitter](https://twitter.com/akaiikowrites). you might, if you enjoyed this and want more, consider checking out the pinned tweet. just sayin.


	3. the one with the shirt (dcmb chap 1)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you can once again thank [@patchoffeathers](https://twitter.com/PatchOfFeathers) for this. an angel. truly.

There’s a word for it.

Fuck if he knows what to do with that knowledge. All he’s done with it so far is burn his arm and send Keith into the human equivalent of a 404 Error Gateway. If his old staff sergeant was still around, he would’ve been told to apologize to the grass for wasting its oxygen with his mouthbreathing idiocy. Kicker is that his old staff sergeant wouldn’t have been wrong.

Shiro knows he needs to say something. Keith’s sure as fuck not saying anything. The longer they sit across from one another, with Shiro’s arm on the table between them draped in a damp paper towel like a funeral shroud, the more awkward everything gets. Neither of them can quite look at each other. Between the two of them, though, Shiro’s pretty sure he’s meant to be the responsible one. The adult.

But there’s a word for it—for the need that’s dogged his steps since he first saw Keith in the line for student IDs and felt his world narrow down to this whip slender boy with sad eyes. Maybe he can catch a break for turning stupid.

Across the way, Keith shifts in his chair. “Is your arm...okay?”

Stilted as the question is, Shiro feels a brief flash of pride that Keith chose to break the silence. That flash is chased by a twist in his gut. Fuck, there’s a _word_ for this. For all of this. Not the time to think about that. Shiro coughs as he pulls the towel off his arm and crumples it into a ball. “It’s fine,” he says. Exposing his arm to the air wasn’t the best idea. It’s red, and looks rawer than it feels. Keith looks at his arm pointedly before flicking his gaze up to Shiro. “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

Even before Keith sets his jaw mulishly, he knows what’s coming. “It doesn’t look fine.” Forget stilted or awkward. There’s nothing but stubbornness in Keith’s voice now.

“The coffee wasn’t that hot.” What Shiro means by it is, _it looks worse than it is_ , which is true. It wouldn’t reassure Keith, but he knows what burns of all degrees feel like and this is barely a first degree. Some Neosporin and he’ll be fine. What Keith seems to get from it is face value.

Dark eyes narrow and pink lips part, obviously gearing up for some kind of scathing comeback, because he’s never learned to pick his battles. Shiro has. All it takes is patience—and an expression he learned from his first bunkmate in Iraq—for Keith to give in. Not _gracefully_. The concept of giving in gracefully is anathema for someone like him. But giving in, anyway, complete with arms folded across his chest.

It’s cute. It also frames up the words that started all of this: _Daddy’s Little Boy_.

And, fuck, eventually he’s going to stop feeling it like a gut punch when he’s reminded that there’s a word for this. Eventually. Not yet.

Shiro lets his eyes trace along the glittering red words for what feels like the hundredth time. The shirt is a standard cut for Keith—crew neck, fitted at the breadth of his shoulders but running looser round his slender waist, charcoal black. Enough that he figures maybe Keith picked this out himself. Maybe Keith wanted this. The possessive apostrophe of _Daddy’s_ catches the light and sparkles aggressively. Even if Keith wanted this—picked it out and pulled it on—that doesn’t mean he was ready to share it.

This happens, sometimes. Shiro forgets himself and cracks open Keith’s shell with greedy fingers. Not on purpose. Never on purpose and that’s the only reason he can forgive himself. The damage is done all the same. It’s been done now. A better man would let it go.

Instead Shiro wonders if this has always been part of Keith or if it’s something recent. He isn’t sure which answer would be better. The romantic part of him likes the idea that Keith’s always wanted this—wanted to be someone’s baby boy—and then the two of them found each other like gravity. The rest of him digs claws and teeth and need into the idea that Keith’s only found this with him. When he cracks open Keith’s shell, his boy is all tender underbelly and he’d do terrible things before sharing that aching vulnerability with anyone. Guess that answers which is better.

Words are heavy on his tongue. A hopeless refrain of _when did it happen?_ that he already knows would never get answers because that would be too vulnerable. Keith scares easy, when it comes to things like this. Even knowing that, he wants to ask because he wants to see if their puzzle piece edges match up.

All this time, Shiro thought he was alone with this need that lives in his gut. It’s been with him since the first time he saw Keith, and it’s only gotten worse each time he’s seen a little more of Keith. Maybe that first year he could’ve saved himself. Maybe, but probably not. Already too late when he’d found himself cradling Keith to his chest, barely daring to breathe in case he woke his boy, thinking that he’d go through every bit of sand scoured hell all over again if he could just have this. Just. This.

The idea that Keith needs it to is almost too much, and if it’s true then Shiro’s the luckiest SOB in the entire goddamn world.

Across the table, Keith jerks in his chair and tightens his crossed arms in a defensive gesture. Too late it strikes that keeping quiet so long wasn’t his best idea. “I’m just—” Keith says. Despite his usual almost predatory grace, he struggles to get out of his chair. “Just gonna—” Again his arms tighten. He wobbles dangerously. It’d be funny if it weren’t so fucked. “You know—”

What Shiro wants to say, he can’t, so he settles for: “That a new shirt?”

“Yeah,” Keith says, wary and cagey as a coyote caught in a trap.

Marshaling himself, Shiro drags his gaze away from the shirt and focuses on Keith’s face. _Sweet boy_ , he thinks, and buries the thought before it can escape him.

It’s not that the way Keith is looking at him is new. Familiarity is written in the pinch around his indigo eyes, and the subtle jut of his lower lip, and the way his shoulders seem to shrink in like he needs to provide a smaller target. All that’s new is the way Shiro understands this, and understands the way that Keith relaxes the longer their gaze holds. There’s victory already written in the way Keith hasn’t fled. In the way he wobbles, arms still tight across his chest, but doesn’t break eye contact. In the way he’s waiting for Shiro’s cue.

“Why?”

“Lance,” Keith blurts. Accusation and absolution in one.

Breathing in deeply, Shiro resists the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose or something else that Keith’ll misunderstand. He likes Lance. They all like Lance. Sometimes its begrudging and vaguely against their wills. But they do like him. Only he has to wonder—more often than he’d like—why Lance’s name is used to explain easily 90% of the bullshit that happens in their friend group. That’s too much of the bullshit.

Sensing all of this—or maybe just Shiro’s carefully controlled ire—Keith goes, “Remember when we went to the club last summer? We saw this on the walk back. I guess Lance thought it was…” It’s obvious Keith’s not aware of his own expression, because it contorts through shades of embarrassed and irritated.

“Lance thought it was?” Shiro leans forward and braces his elbows on his knees. It takes a little of the pressure off his back, which is still achey from sleeping wrong the night before and from the IED that got his arm. 

Almost a minute passes. Keith’s mouth presses into a sour pout before he says, with all due reluctance: “Relevant.”

“Is it?” How he manages to get that out calm is beyond Shiro, because his heart’s in his throat and that’s the least of his problems.

Keith’s eyes go wide. “What?”

“Is it relevant?”

There’s a chance Shiro wouldn’t have asked, if he’d known that Keith would collapse at the question like a puppet with cut strings. It’s graceless enough to send the chair skidding across the floor. Not far, but enough. He spares Keith some worry, because his boy isn’t ever this clumsy. Only then he catches how Keith’s looking at him, and it’s not a sweet look but the desperation in it tugs at something in his gut anyway. “ _No_ ,” Keith says. Gasps. Almost whines.

Biting his cheek, Shiro focuses on the fact that Keith needs comfort. In the end that’s always going to be the most important thing. “It would be okay if it was.”

“Well, it’s not.”

Fuck. Shiro _knows_ Keith is lying—can read it in the mulish timbre of his voice and the faint tremble at his too full lower lip. But he also knows they’ve pushed too far, too fast. “It’s okay if it’s not,” he says. Moving his chair closer, he barely resists the urge to lift Keith’s chin. “It’s okay, Keith.”

The look Keith gives him then could bring armies to their knees. People focus on the sharp angles. The bony elbows that drive into a solar plexus during bar fights, or the firm jaw always ready to take a blow, or the stubborn flash in those impossible indigo eyes. They see Keith like he is now, and they only see a half feral creature slunk in from the desert instead of the half tame boy desperate for comfort. Keith is _his_ to protect, and he’s done a shit job of that so far this morning.

“I know it’s okay,” Keith says, and he’s still lying. “It’s Lance’s dumb idea of a joke. I don’t care.” Of course he cares. No one in the world cares as much or as fiercely as Keith. “I don’t even know why he thought it was funny.” Which is probably the only true thing he’s said in the last five minutes.

Huffing on a laugh, Shiro gives in and cups his hand over the nape of Keith’s neck. Carefully he digs his fingertips into tense muscle. Patience is the watchword when he does this. Starting from the base of Keith’s skull and moving down, releasing each tight knot with slow but firm pressure that eventually will leave Keith boneless. It’s easier nowadays—not just because he knows what to do but because they don’t have to fight each other for this. Somewhere in the last handful of months, Keith learned to accept this. To accept the petting that comes after all the pain is gone. “Maybe,” he whispers, “Lance knows you need someone to take care of you.”

“I don’t.” But even as he says it, he collapses further onto Shiro’s shoulder and his eyes struggle to remain open.

“Keith,” Shiro says, and wishes to god he could call the boy in his arms something else, “You could stand to let someone take care of you sometimes.”

“But—”

If he wanted, he could let Keith try to cling to his pride with an argument that won’t mean anything in the end. Sometimes that’s what it means to protect him. But sometimes what it means to protect him is to protect him even from himself.

Tightening his hand over Keith’s nape, he waits until he feels Keith go limp in the way of scruffed kittens before pulling him in. It’s a soft collision. Keith’s face fits perfectly into the crook of his neck. Any worry he might’ve felt about the manhandling is buried beneath the way that Keith nuzzles against him, still kittenlike and so fucking sweet. Every drop of fight leaves Keith then, and he’s dead weight in Shiro’s arms because he knows that he’s safe.

Pride thrills through Shiro, and he feels full and warm and fierce. Even when Keith mutters _cheater_ , he can’t feel anything but fond amusement. “I know.” Because he does. “You going to be good for me, now?”

There’s a pause. “I…” Keith is oddly quiet. “I’m always good.”

“I know, Keith.” Curling his fingers more firmly around Keith’s neck, he lets himself relish the warm rush of his boy’s breath against his neck and the trusting weight of him in his arms. “I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me: this is going to be funny and dumb  
> also me: oh no, shiro's having feelings (again)
> 
> you can come yell with me about this @ [my twitter](https://twitter.com/akaiikowrites). also, if you liked this, you maaay want to check out my pinned tweet. ahem.


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